1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates, generally, to devices used for material handling, and more specifically, pallets and skids. More specifically, the present invention is directed toward a folded corrugated pallet.
2. Description of the Related Art
Typically, pallets are made from wood and molded polymers, allowing them to support heavy loads and be reused more than once or twice. While wood and molded polymer pallets have generally worked for their intended purposes, they suffer from certain disadvantages. For example, these types of pallets are relatively heavy, weighing approximately forty-five pounds. The weight of the pallets becomes significant when the number of pallets needed to accompany any given shipment of goods increases. The added weight reduces fuel economy and other efficiencies in the material handling process. In addition, and notwithstanding the relatively robust weight of the wood and molded polymer pallets of the type known in the related art, they suffer from the fact that they often end up broken after use of less than six times and are not recyclable.
In the past, there have been attempts at providing corrugated cardboard pallets as a low cost alternative to wood and molded polymer pallets. However, these attempts have been largely unsuccessful because the corrugated pallets have a much lower weight capacity than that of a wood or polymer pallet. Additionally, corrugated cardboard pallets typically do not last as long as wood or polymer pallets. Thus, there remains a need for a low cost corrugated cardboard pallet with an increased weight capacity and able to be reused several times.